Description
Book SynopsisAmericans in recent years have become thoroughly disenchanted with our political campaigns, especially with campaign advertising and speeches. Each year, as November approaches, we are bombarded with visceral appeals that bypass substance, that drape candidates in the American flag but tell us nothing about what they''ll do if elected, that flood us with images of PT-109 or Willie Horton, while significant issues--such as Kennedy''s Addison''s Disease or the looming S&L catastrophe--are left unexamined. And the press--the supposed safeguard of democracy--focuses on campaign strategy over campaign substance, leaving us to decide where the truth lies. In Dirty Politics, campaign analyst Kathleen Hall Jamieson provides an eye-opening look at political ads and speeches, showing us how to read, listen to, and watch political campaigns. Jamieson provides a sophisticated (and often humorous) analysis of advertising technique, describing how television ads use soft focus, slow motion, lyrical
Trade ReviewIf you read this book--and you should--you will never again listen to a news broadcast or read a newspaper in the same way ... Reading Dirty Politics leave one with the troubling conviction that our democracy is threatened by the failure to provide voters with the information they need to make meaningful use of the right to vote ... Impressively research, clearly written and organized, and enlightening througout. * Washington Post Book World *
An illuminating primer about the dangerously subtle distortions of video politics. * Philadelphia Inquirer *
